Letting your hair down
by veiledbride
Summary: A hair-raising mishap in Gryffindor tower forces Ron to rescue his one true love-Hermione Granger.


So this is just a short little story I thought of after thinking about how awesome fairy tales are! Its meant to be fun, so don't take it too seriously! Enjoy!

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Harry and Ron sat in a corner of the common room, playing an intense game of chess. Ginny, seated in the chair beside Harry, was reading an article in the Quibbler, while Neville was perched behind Ron, breathing down his neck.

"Neville, you're distracting me with your breathing. How am I supposed to beat Harry if you keep distracting me!"

"Sorry Ron," Neville said before slouching off to the dormitory.

"Finally!" Ron exclaimed. "A little quiet."

He peered over at Harry, who had a look of extreme concentration on his face as he tried to find his next move. Ron had bet 3 galleons that he could beat Harry three times in a row without losing. This was their last game, and so far, Ron had Harry beaten.

Harry went to move one of his pieces but withdrew his hand after Ron snorted.

"Would you stop doing that? I can't even make a play without you psyching me out! I know you already have all the plays worked out in your head, but could you stop vocalizing them!" Harry said exasperatedly.

Ron just smirked at him. "I'm just trying to prevent you from making a wrong move."

Harry picked up one of his pieces to chuck at Ron's head, but was interrupted by a loud rumbling coming from above. Ginny set down her magazine.

"What on earth is going on up there?"

The rumbling started to grow louder, and a shriek came down the girl's dormitory staircase. The shrieks grew louder until Lavender and Parvati appeared, running down the stairs and headed towards the Fat Lady's portrait.

"RUN!" Parvati yelled as she ran past the chess game.

"Save yourselves!" Lavender shrieked at them. "It's coming!"

"What's coming?" Harry asked, but he never got a response. The two of them were already out the door, and he could see for himself what they were running from.

Curling down from the girl's dormitories was a rapidly moving sea of brown curly hair. People shrieked as they saw it slither towards them, and there was a mad dash to escape the common room.

"Bloody hell!" Ron exclaimed as he got up to run away. Harry grabbed Ginny's hand and pulled her to her feet. They ran towards the portrait door, but were stuck waiting, as too many people were trying to escape all at once.

Ron looked behind him to see the hair rushing towards them. It was filling the common room, and would soon be coming for them.

"Hold on to me!" he yelled at Ginny. She grabbed his hand while still holding on to Harry's. The force of the hair collided with Ron first, propelling him forward. The hair hit the escaping crowd pushing them out of the common room and into the safety of the hallway.

When Ron stood up, he saw that the hair had stopped at the portrait hole. Several people were trying to shut the hole up with an angry Pink Lady, but the hair kept springing the portrait back at them.

Harry helped Ginny stand as Ron clambered to his feet. Harry looked over at him and grinned.

"I think you lost the bet!"

Ron marched over to punch Harry in the arm. Ginny left the now wrestling boys and strode over to a sobbing Lavender, who was being consoled by Parvati.

"What on earth happened?"

Parvati looked up at Ginny while she patted Lavender's back, trying to calm her down.

"Lavender just wanted to try out some new beauty techniques she'd seen in a magazine. Hermione was sitting there studying. Lavender just wanted to try it out on someone…"

"You mean all that hair is Hermione's?"

Lavender started bawling even more. It was difficult for her to talk over the sobs.

"I-I-I just wanted to use the h-h-hair lengthening c-c-charm. Now our r-r-room is destroyed!"

Lavender fell into a fresh wave of tears, but Ginny was fuming and started to grab Lavender away from Parvati in an attempt to shake Lavender into her senses.

"You daft girl! All you care about is your room while Hermione is trapped up there! How can you be so stupid!"

When Ginny slapped Lavender across the face to try and get her to stop crying, Harry and Ron were instantly by her side, trying to haul her off the crying girl.

"Ginny! Stop! Stop!"

They managed to pull her away, but she was breathing heavily and glaring at them.

"It's Hermione! Lavender put some kind of charm on her hair to but she's too incompetent to know how to stop it!"

Harry and Ron were staring at her baffled. She sighed at their confusion.

"Hermione is upstairs, with a sea of hair keeping her from getting out and the rest of us from getting in."

"Ohhhh. Right. Makes sense now," Ron said.

Harry turned to the portrait door, where a wall of hair blocked the entrance. He took out his wand and walked over to the hair.

"Incendio!"

The hair caught on fire, crackling and hissing while sparking like mad, sending embers all over the place. One fourth years robes started on fire. She glared at Harry as she put the fire out.

"Sorry!"

They turned back to the hair, but the fire had fizzled out.

"There's just too much of it I guess. I thought it would have all just burnt up."

"What were you going to do when the fire reached the common room and started everything else on fire?" Ginny asked.

Harry shrugged. "Didn't really think that far ahead."

Ginny was next to try get rid of the hair. She cast a powerful Diffindo on the hair, but as soon as a chunk of the hair fell off, more grew to replace it.

"Hmmm…it must be trying to protect itself. The fire burnt out when it should have just kept going. It can't be cut. I don't know what will get us up to Hermione."

Ron had been quiet while Harry and Ginny had been trying to find a solution. Ginny was now directing people to go and find a teacher, but jumped when Ron shouted, "I'VE GOT IT!"

He ran down the hallway, flying past Gryffindors who were about to discover there was no way to get into their dormitory. He whizzed down the Grand Staircase and almost knocked over Professor Flitwick when he ran past him as he hurried outside to the Grounds.

Ron jogged briskly towards the Quidditch pitch. Upon arrival, he went searching for a half-decent broom in the cupboard. His eyes fell on a fairly decent looking Cleansweep, grabbing it and heading back out to the grounds. He hoped his plan would work.

He climbed on the broom and soared up into the air. He flew around the castle until he reached Gryffindor tower. Hair flowed from many of the windows, but a few were still open. He slowed down and paused in mid air to try and figure out which window might be the one to Hermione's dorm. He had never asked Hermione what floor she lived on, so he decided that peering into all the open windows might help him find Hermione.

As he started to fly again he saw that the window to his dorm was open and someone was waving their arms at him. Yelling out the window was a very distressed Neville.

"Ron! Hey! Over here! Ron, I'm trapped in here!"

"I can't get you yet Neville! I have to get Hermione first! It's her hair that's keeping you in!" Ron shouted back, soaring away from Neville.

Poor Neville sighed and sat down on the window seat. "Girls are always the ones that get rescued."

Back outside, Ron started to shout Hermione's name while he flew up to each window to see if she was inside. No response ever came back to him, so he kept flying until he reached the top of the tower, and the last of the windows.

It was open and free of any blockades, so he got as close as he could before throwing himself through the window. He landed with a thud into the dark room, only to hear sobbing once he'd composed himself. The only place that wasn't filled with hair was the small area Ron was standing in, and the spot beside him, where a bed was situated.

On the edge of the bed sat Hermione, who was facing him, face in her hands. Behind her, her hair flowed throughout the room, filling up the rest of the dorm before making its way out the door.

"Hermione?" he said gently.

She looked up at him with red eyes and tear stained cheeks. She hiccoughed.

"Ron? What are you doing here? Have I hurt anyone? Did everyone escape?" she said hoarsely.

Ron stepped over a lock of hair that was curled on the floor and sat down on the bed beside her.

"Don't worry about it Hermione. I think everyone got out. Besides Neville, but he's fine really…."

Hermione frowned at him for leaving Neville, but decided against chastising him for it. She spotted the broom lying on the floor and realized that Ron had flown all the way up the tower to rescue her. "That was very clever of you to fly up here. What made you think of that?"

"We tried going through the common room, but the spells we tried didn't work. Then I thought about that story you told me. Ropinzel or whatever it was."

Hermione snorted "You mean Rapunzel?"

"Yeah, that's the one where that bloke climbs up the tower on Ripoozel's hair. I figured a broom would be easier than trying to scale a tower."

"Well I'm glad you're here. My wand is on the other side of the bed, and all my hair is preventing me from reaching it. Can you cut it off? The hair is charmed to keep growing, but I think Finite will stop the charm."

Ron pulled out his wand, muttering Finite around Hermione's head, than cast a quick Diffindo. Hermione's hair fell to the floor, leaving her with a new, short haircut. She reached up to touch her hair.

"That's going to take some getting used to I think!"

"I like it already," Ron said, causing Hermione to blush.

Ron started to vanish the hair around the bed, allowing Hermione to search for her wand. Once she had recovered it, they both started to vanish the hair, slowly making their way towards the stairs. The hair prevented them from sliding down the stairs that had turned into a slide because of Ron's presence, but it made for a cumbersome journey.

It took them a while to finally reach the common room and clear out the whole area. By the time they made it to the portrait hole, they could hear people yelling on the other side.

Once they cleared the rest of the hair, they saw a group of Gryffindors waiting for entrance into the common room, and another group, all teachers, trying to figure out how to enter the common room.

Ginny looked up at saw Ron and Hermione standing in the portrait hole laughing at the group.

"Ron! You got Hermione out! We wondered where you had gone to!"

The teachers stopped bickering and turned to them.

"Ms. Granger. Are you alright?" McGonagall asked. "Ms. Brown told us what happened. We were just trying to figure out how to rescue you. I'm sorry it took us so long."

Hermione smiled at the professor as she slipped her hand into Ron's.

"That's ok Professor. My prince charming came and saved me just in time."

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Well I hoped you enjoyed. Let me know what you think, and whether or not I should attempt another fairy tale/Harry Potter story!


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